HAMPTON — A 70-year-old man has been charged with the sledgehammer killing of Robert “Bob” Roderick, who was found dead in his apartment on M Street by neighbors just after midnight Friday.

The attorney general's office announced Monday that Peter Bartoloni, also of 19 M Street, was arrested and charged with second-degree murder.

Court documents state Bartoloni knowingly caused the death of Roderick by striking him repeatedly with a sledgehammer.

Neighbors in the close-knit community said Roderick was the kind of person who got along with others. “If you ever had a problem with him it was squashed the next day or even the next hour,” Shannon Hodgdon, Roderick's neighbor said. Her unit is adjacent to where Roderick and Bartoloni lived as roommates.

Nicole Belanger, a neighbor who lives across the way from the Roderick's apartment, said her boyfriend, Scott Anderson, also lived with the two men. She said Monday that when he was drinking, Bartoloni often bragged about committing crimes. He even claimed to have killed his ex-wife and her lover when he found them together, Belanger said.

Belanger and Anderson were the ones who found Roderick, Hodgdon said. She confirmed the men drank heavily.

“They said 'There's blood everywhere. Bob's not OK.' I tried to take care of him. I thought he was going through alcohol withdrawal again,” Hodgdon said.

Hodgdon said approximately three weeks ago Roderick was so sick from alcohol withdrawal, he was throwing up blood.

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Shannon Hodgdon (left) and Nicole Belanger

Bartoloni was in court Monday on separate charges he knowingly failed to register and/or report as a sexual offender. He is scheduled to be arraigned at Seabrook Circuit Court at 11 a.m. Tuesday for the murder charges.

According to Assistant Attorney General Peter Hinckley, an autopsy determined Roderick died of multiple blunt impact injuries to his head.

It wasn't immediately clear whether Bartoloni has a lawyer.

Bertolini was initially arrested Saturday in Hampton and charged with failing to report his sex-offender status to police. His sex-offender status is related an assault with intent to commit rape conviction in 1980 and a rape conviction in 1990.